


In Toto

by Rucksack (wingblade)



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Modern Era, Portland Oregon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-04
Updated: 2014-07-04
Packaged: 2018-02-07 10:44:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1896114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wingblade/pseuds/Rucksack
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Axel has been Roxas' best friend since he was seven. Axel has known Roxas keeps a journal since he was twelve. Axel has been reading them ever since.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Toto

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rarfie](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=rarfie).



> Written for my friend, Tabitha, at two in the morning, and typed up on my phone at four. I saw "in toto" while looking for something completely unrelated in my thesaurus, and I thought it fit. Also inspired by a few lines from Bastille's "Things We Lost In The Fire." Incoherent fluff galore.

Axel has been Roxas' best friend since he was seven. Axel has known Roxas keeps a journal since he was twelve. Axel has been reading them ever since.

Roxas keeps them stacked neatly beneath his bed. Some of the older ones are packed away in boxes, pushed back behind the clothes hanging in his closet. The boxes are covered in dust. Axel knows this because he checks. He ran a finger over one once, just to make sure, but he hasn't touched them since. When Roxas asks him to run up and retrieve something from his room, which isn't often, sometimes Axel will crouch on the floor and pull back his friends' carefully hung shirts and sweaters. The cheap fibers of the carpet scratch his skin; Roxas has always had the same room, and the same damn carpet. Axel has slept over enough through the years to hate it vehemently. It's impossible to sleep on, unless he lies completely still, which he has never accomplished. Every night, he ends up staring at the ceiling, projecting his thoughts upon its blank surface. Then he turns onto his side and Roxas is lying up above him on his bed, facing the window. Facing away from him. This is reality.

The notebooks under the bed, however, are fair game. Axel knows where each belong; never has he misplaced a single one. He enjoys reliving their mid-to-late teenage years in these journals, all through the eyes of his best friend, despite having been right there beside him. Once Roxas broke his arm skateboarding, and Axel was the one who called nine-one-one. When Axel crashed his first car in a street race, Roxas was there on the sidelines, ready to return the favor. It was almost worth it from the way Roxas laughed at him when he heard the fine Axel had to pay.

When Axel reads the journals, he preserves these events. But they’re nothing new. The way Roxas was pissed at Axel all the nights he went out drinking, or the way Roxas loved Axel’s singing as he made breakfast — Axel knows all of this. What Axel truly adores about the notebooks are how Roxas words everything. Sometimes he embellishes the simplest of things, like when the two of them painted Roxas’ room black. Then about how, less than a week later, they painted it something much, much lighter after Roxas realized he wouldn’t be able to see the spiders crawling on his walls. Roxas makes it all feel so unreal, like Axel’s reading a book for English class. Other things, Roxas writes so plainly, as if having a fight with his parents wasn’t so bad, or smashing a lamp in his room was a regular occurrence for him. Axel loves everything Roxas has written because they are Roxas’ words.

Usually Axel reads through the older books; thumbing through something so recent feels too personal. He’s already breaking the best friend code, so maybe there isn’t much more to lose, but he refrains, nonetheless.

Now, as Roxas is in the living room, tying his shoes, he asks Axel if he can grab his bookbag from his room. Axel gallops up the stairs and takes the opportunity to snatch up another journal, but this one is different. It’s different because it’s at the top of the pile closest to Roxas’ pillow.

It’s the last journal in his friend’s massive archive, and when Axel turns to the last page, it’s blank. Confusion straining his eyes, he flips the pages backwards, one after the other. This can’t be Roxas’ current journal, because he keeps the one he’s still using in his nightstand. Axel pulls open the drawer, and its contents consist of Roxas’ old wallet, a pencil, and one of the books he’s been reading.

Axel exhales nervously; a slow, shaky breath. He turns to the very first page of the notebook in his hands and reads the only three words on the entire page.

_I love him._

It’s dated a year ago.

* * *

The semester has just ended, so Axel can’t ask Roxas about what he read. On top of his best friend stressing about finals, he can’t throw this on him, too: “Oh, hey! We’ve been best friends basically our entire lives, but, just so you know, I’ve been a terrible friend who invades your privacy! Yeah, Roxas, I’ve been reading your journals since middle school! You’re not pissed, are you?”

The words he read are bothering him. They’re something he never knew about his closest friend. For once, instead of feeling a delightful sense of reminiscence, he feels like he’s stumbled onto something entirely intimate. Something Roxas has been able to hide from him this whole time. And why would this make Roxas stop writing, after everything? After each painstakingly etched log of his life up to this point?

Axel can’t be in Roxas’ room. He can barely even look at him. When Roxas asks Axel to wait in his room while he finishes cleaning, Axel forces a toothy grin and bolts out to his car. He turns on the radio, but every song on his favorite station makes him think of Roxas. Absentmindedly, he switches the stations around until he finds one where he can’t understand half of what’s being sung. His fingers tap his thigh erratically to no beat. 

Roxas makes fun of him for gaping out the window — and his odd taste in music — when he finishes his chores and joins him in the car.

“Are you drooling?” he teases. Axel looks over and soaks in the nice checkered shirt Roxas is wearing, open to a fitting white undershirt. He tries to ignore the worried smile pressing against him, scalding his skin. 

Axel retorts, “Only in your dreams,” but he makes a dramatic show of wiping his chin once his eyes return forward. Anything to make Roxas laugh.

Originally, Axel had thought it would be a great idea to make a big deal about watching the fireworks at the waterfront. They never did much for the Fourth of July, or any holiday. Roxas didn’t let him celebrate his birthday. Christmas was a tame affair. On Halloween, they always bought candy but never had any trick-or-treaters, so they ate all the chocolate and watched awful horror movies all night. The last thing Axel really had to celebrate was his own birthday, which ended up awkward every year. He didn’t have much else to do, so he’d end up bar-hopping. This always upset Roxas. Last year, he had actually cried. Thus, Axel wanted them to spend an amicable day together, especially after the grueling semester they had.

His thoughts keep coming back to the stupid notebook, and how there could be something like this, so important in Roxas’ life, that he didn’t know. He thought he knew everything, especially with being able to recount all of their memories through the dozens of periodicals on their lives Roxas has stashed away. Now he just feels hollow.

Sunset is dying down once they finally settle in to watch the fireworks. Roxas brought a blanket for them to sit on, so they’re able to stretch their arms back. When Roxas’ hand bumps into Axel’s, he wants to smile, but how could he be so happy from such a small mishap? But then Roxas doesn’t move his hand away; if anything, it’s closer now. Axel can feel the short, bitten nails run along his fingers. After the first pop and crack of fireworks in the sky, Roxas sighs and lies his head on Axel’s shoulder.

It would be so easy to wrap his arm around him. So easy. In the end, it’s Roxas who grabs his friend’s arm and wraps it around himself. He holds it against him tightly, as if it were his own. His hand is trembling. Axel’s is, too.

Axel pulls him in closer, pressing his face into the blond strands he has loved for so long. He breathes in the scent of coconut shampoo; Roxas’ favorite. The only reason Axel ever tried the fruit — and will ever continue to purchase such an expensive food and crack open its hard, obnoxious shell — is because of Roxas. Once, he bitterly thought it represented Roxas well; difficult and painful to open, but wonderful on the inside. Despite the multitudes of stubbed fingers, there has always been a silver lining.

Cupping his cheek cautiously, Axel turns Roxas’ face towards his. It’s dark, but he can see the clearness of his eyes.

Axel surmises now being a good enough time as any.

“I read your journals.” He pauses thoughtfully, then admits, “All of them.”

Roxas places his hands over Axel’s and hums quietly. “Is that it?”

“‘Is that...it?’” Axel’s grip tightens slightly, wanting nothing more than to erase the gap between them, but he’s too ashamed. He’s betrayed Roxas’ trust for so long, always craving a closeness they never had.

There’s a particularly loud squeal in the sky, and Axel winces.

“So, you read the last one?” There’s a playful look in his eyes Axel can’t quite read. “Why did it take you so long?”

“‘Take me...so long?’”

“To find it. And read it.”

Lip quivering, Axel closes his eyes, leaning in to brush their noses together. “You...knew.” 

Roxas laughs, louder than Axel has ever heard. “Of course I did. Why do you think I kept so much...out? About...you?” Beneath his hands, Roxas’ face warms immensely. 

What a clever boy, Axel thinks to himself. What a clever, clever boy. But the most powerful thought in his mind right now is how much he’s in love with his best friend, and how much he’d like to kiss him.

“Are you going to kiss me?” Roxas murmurs, reading his mind without even trying. “Or…”

Their lips meet tenderly, at first; curious. This is their first kiss, and, for all he knows, Roxas’ very first, so he strives to make it special. He swipes the tip of his tongue along Roxas’ lip just once, and he can feel the blond’s body falling, his posture softening into wet clay in his hands, so Axel uses his strength to hold him up. Opening his mouth slowly, Roxas shyly follows his lead, their breaths — soft — mingling with one another’s. 

It is entire; it is whole. It is the only thing Axel needs.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope the coconut part made you laugh.


End file.
